Ten Pieces

Brief: Create a brochure, which will inform children and parents of the BBC “Ten Pieces” initiative and spark stimulation with classical music. You will focus on typography as well as imagery and execute your typographical creative solution in a professionally finished presentation form fit for the target market (children aged 7 to 12, and parents).

For this project I decided to create my own interpretations of each musical piece by creating illustrations people can relate to by listening to the music, but are not specific images (music is conceptual after all). I decided to create a 24 page booklet which enabled me to use a 2 page spread for each ‘piece’; the right page has an illustration and the left page has information about the composer & the musical piece. All the illustrations are made up of separate shapes which reveal negative space lines and show you an abstract image connected to the piece; these are inspired by many things such as the style, rhythm, tone, instruments and/or the story behind each piece.

Each of the pieces has it own colour scheme to differentiate and link with the emotions associated with the music. The covers, introduction and ‘Connect it’ pages however are similar as they are all link specifically to the Ten Pieces (‘Connect It’ created for the initiative itself). I chose to use black for the backgrounds here to emphasise the colourful variations for the 10 pieces inside; almost like your mind being blank first and as soon as the music starts, images and colours start to formulate and grow. I decided to use light blue, light orange, lime and white for these pages obviously so they can be seen against the black, but also to look luminous and lively so it can appeal to children and make the covers look attractive.

For typography, I decided to use Gill Sans Regular for the main body text; not only because the BBC use it in their logo and for most of their graphic designs, but I felt it was the best for it’s readability, practicality, modern sans serif look and suitability towards parents and children. For the front title I used the style of the illustrations and symbols used in music sheets to create the typeface. Originally I was going to create similar typefaces for each piece (or use Gill Sans Bold) but they drew too much attention to themselves, so decided to use Gill Sans Light for the titles within the booklet.

If you want to see my thought process with each piece, you can check out my different blog posts in the Ten Pieces section on my website. And to see the BBC perform each piece for their ‘Ten Pieces’ film, there is a list of links to each video at the bottom of the page. My final solutions are underneath and thank you for taking the time to look at my work; feel free to comment you thoughts below.

Watch the orchestra performances that feature in the Ten Pieces film by clicking the different links below. (All performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales except for “Connect It”)